Clinton suggests Libyan consulate attack was work of Al Qaeda affiliate

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton suggested the deadly consulate attack in Libya involved the Al Qaeda affiliate in North Africa, going further than any other Obama administration official has yet in acknowledging the assault was the work of hardened terrorists.

Clinton was speaking to foreign leaders gathered at a meeting convened by U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon to address the threat of extremism in the region.

“Now with a larger safe haven and increased freedom to maneuver, terrorists are seeking to extend their reach and their networks in multiple directions,” Clinton told the group, according to a New York Times report. “And they are working with other violent extremists to undermine the democratic transitions under way in North Africa, as we tragically saw in Benghazi.”

It wasn't the first time Clinton had referred to the attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya, as a terrorist attack. But her reference to the group Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb was notable, especially as President Obama still has yet to publicly refer to the attack as terrorism.

Republicans have pounced on the administration's shifting explanation for the Sept. 11 attack, which left U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans dead. Administration officials initially described it as "spontaneous" violence, possibly related to protests against an anti-Islam film produced in the U.S., but the administration has gradually walked that explanation back while acknowledging the attack was an act of terror.

The White House said Wednesday that Obama, too, considers the deadly assault a terrorist attack. Press Secretary Jay Carney said it is "certainly the case that it is our view as an administration, and the president's view, that it was a terrorist attack."

Carney's comments came after Mitt Romney accused Obama of failing to "level with the American people" about the nature of the attack.

Obama has declined several chances to call the incident a terrorist attack. He said last week that extremists used an anti-Islam video as an excuse to assault U.S. interests, and in an interview this week on ABC's "The View," he would only say that it clearly "wasn't just a mob action."

On Capitol Hill, eight Republicans who head House committees sent a letter to Obama saying they were disturbed by statements from administration officials suggesting that the attack was a protest gone wrong rather than a terrorist attack. They said they would be willing to return to Washington from Congress' nearly two-month recess if the administration scheduled another briefing on Libya.

Clinton and senior Pentagon and intelligence officials briefed members of the House and Senate last Thursday on Libya.

Republican Sens. John McCain of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina called the continued threat of terrorism "an inconvenient truth" for Obama, given his re-election campaign's efforts to tout the progress made against Al Qaeda.

“But it is not too much to ask why the president and his administration have taken so long to state what has appeared obvious for a long time about what really happened in Benghazi," the senators said in a joint statement. "This is just one more example of this president's failure to lead in the Middle East and how that failure has threatened America's national security interests. Now is not the time to lead from behind.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Al Qaeda affiliate, Islamist militia eyed in ‘coordinated’ consulate attack in Libya, sources say

The attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya, last week was a joint operation orchestrated by an Al Qaeda affiliate in North Africa and the Islamist militia Ansar Al-Sharia, an intelligence source told Fox News, citing evidence collected so far in the investigation.

About 100 attackers carried out the "coordinated assault,” intelligence sources said, further discrediting earlier Obama administration claims that the deadly attack was a "spontaneous" outburst in response to an anti-Islam film.

Fox News' sources say the attack came in two waves and involved rocket-propelled grenades, as well as mortar fire, and both the consulate and safe house were attacked seemingly with inside knowledge.

Ansar Al-Sharia is not directly affiliated with Al Qaeda, but has sympathetic goals. Ansar has tried and failed to establish an Islamic state in eastern Libya. The militia is a name adopted by a handful of groups, including Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.

A senior Arab government official told Fox News in December 2011 that it was an effort to “rebrand” because the Al Qaeda name had so much baggage.

Libyan officials are now "absolutely convinced" the attack was preplanned, sources say, adding to recent indications that Al Qaeda was involved, specifically a former Guantanamo detainee named Sufyan Ben Qumu.

Four Americans, including U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens, were killed in the strike, which occurred on the 11th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

White House Press Secretary Jay Carney and Susan Rice, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, initially described the attack on the consulate as spontaneous with little evidence of a well-planned assault. Administration officials also pointed to the anti-Islam film that has fueled protests in the Mideast against the United States, suggesting the consulate attack may have begun as one of those protests and escalated.

But this week, the administration began shifting its explanations for the attack, with National Counterterrorism Center Director Matt Olsen testifying before the Senate on Wednesday that it was a "terrorist attack."

Carney followed up by saying for the first time Thursday that it was "self evident" that the attack was an act of terrorism, but President Obama seemed to backtrack a bit when pressed later that day by a TV interviewer. Obama did not reference terrorism, instead invoking the controversial film, which some analysts have said is being used as a tool of extremists to incite violence.

Qumu, the former Guantanamo Bay detainee, is a Libyan who was released from the U.S. prison in Cuba in 2007 and transferred into Libyan custody on the condition he be kept in jail.

He was released by the Qaddafi regime as part of its reconciliation effort with Islamists in 2010.

His Guantanamo files also show he has ties to the financiers behind the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. The declassified files also point to ties with the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, a known Al Qaeda affiliate.

Fox News' Bret Baier, Catherine Herridge and Pamela Browne contributed to this report.

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